In 2017 the European Investment Bank provided EUR 1.05 billion of new financing for solar energy projects around the world, representing the largest ever annual support by the EIB to the solar sector.

Ahead of the Founding Conference of the International Solar Alliance in New Delhi the European Investment Bank also confirmed strengthened engagement to support significant expansion of solar energy in developing and emerging economies.

“Solar power is providing clean energy for millions of people around the world and solar energy now represents the single largest source of new power generation. The fate of this planet depends on continuing to expand the use of renewable energy to support sustainable economic growth. This can be achieved through improved access to energy alongside scaling up a viable alternative to fossil fuels. The European Investment Bank – the EU bank – welcomes the vision of the International Solar Alliance to ensure those countries most vulnerable to climate change can harness the proven potential of solar power,” said Werner Hoyer, President of the European Investment Bank.

India leading focus of EIB backed solar investment outside Europe

India was the leading recipient of EIB financing for solar investment outside the European Union, both in 2017 and overall since 2013. The EIB has approved a total of EUR 640 million of new investment in solar projects in India set to provide clean energy to an estimated 4.2 million households and save more than 4 million tons of carbon emissions.

“The European Union and India are committed to implementing the Paris Climate agreement and working together to achieve Sustainable Development Goals, including ensuring access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all. As the European Union’s bank, the EIB has a strong track record of supporting transformational investment in India and working with Indian partners to enhance solar investment across this country to benefit millions of Indian households.” said H.E. Mr. Tomasz Kozlowski, Ambassador of the European Union.

President Werner Hoyer will lead a high-level European Investment Bank Delegation to attend the International Solar Alliance summit, taking place in New Delhi this week. During the visit the EIB will confirm significant new support for EUR 500 million of new renewable energy investment across India in partnership with the Indian Renewable Energy Development Agency (IREDA).

The European Investment Bank is committed to increasing support for climate related investment, including renewable energy, in developing and emerging economies to represent 35% of overall financing activity.

“More than a trillion dollars of new solar investment will be required by 2030 to deploy affordable solar energy. The European Investment Bank has a unique technical and financing experience of supporting solar projects around the world, enabling new research to further reduce deployment costs and mobilising renewable energy investment. The International Solar Alliance looks forward to welcoming President Hoyer and his colleagues to New Delhi to discuss strengthened cooperation in the years ahead.” said H.E. Upendra Tripathy, Interim Director General of the International Solar Alliance.

During the International Solar Alliance summit the EIB will outline the key role of solar energy investment across a range of technologies to reduce carbon emissions and increase access to clean energy.

Global support for solar investment to address local energy priorities

New EIB financing for solar investment in 2017 included backing for new projects in India, Mexico and Peru, as well as 13 European Union countries.

Since 2002 the EIB has financed more than EUR 6.35 billion of new solar energy investment and 50% of solar investment financed by the EIB in the last 7 years is located in developing and emerging economies. Reflecting the global solar engagement in recent years the EIB has financed photovoltaic and concentrated solar power projects across Africa in Morocco, South Africa and Burkina Faso, in Latin America in Nicaragua and Peru, in Asia in India and Vietnam as well as Turkey and Israel.

This has enabled significant expansion of access to energy using clean power production and contributed to improved economic activity and social benefits. In the coming weeks the EIB is expected to confirm significant financing for off-grid solar projects across Africa.

Background information:

The European Investment Bank (EIB) is the long-term lending institution of the European Union owned by its Member States. It makes long-term finance available for sound investment in order to contribute towards EU policy goals.

LONDON, OCTOBER 6, 2016 – The New York Times has today unveiled a line-up of leading figures set to join New York Times editors Monica Drake, Sam Sifton and Ching-Ching Ni at its inaugural Luxury Travel conference this December 1-2 in Singapore.

The invitation-only event will explore the dramatic ways the luxury travel and hospitality industry is evolving in its quest for the hearts and minds of consumers around the world. The event will bring together the most influential hoteliers, restaurateurs, influencers and experts to provide the insights needed to succeed in this fast-moving and dynamic industry.

For the agenda and speaker lineup, please visit the official Luxury Travel conference website and keep up to date with further speaker announcements by following @NYTLive. The hashtag for the conference is #NYTLT.

Media accreditation for The New York Times Luxury Travel conference is currently open. Accreditation requests must be submitted to press@nytluxurytravel.com by Friday, November 25th. Please note that there will be no on-site accreditation. All accreditation requests are subject to final confirmation by The New York Times.

The New York Times Company

The New York Times Company (NYSE: NYT) is a global media organization dedicated to enhancing society by creating, collecting and distributing high-quality news and information. The company includes The New York Times, International New York Times, NYTimes.com, INYT.com and related properties. It is known globally for excellence in its journalism, and innovation in its print and digital storytelling and its business model. Follow news about the company at @NYTimesComm.

“Tired of lying in the sunshine staying home to watch the rain.
You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today.
And then one day you find ten years have got behind you.
No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun…- Time, The Dark Side of the Moon, Pink Floyd

The duality with regard to Time arises when we perceive it as ‘Durational’ associated with numerical expression of a ‘before’ and ‘after’ which is measurable. This is old Aristotelian concept of time measured linearly.

The final realization of ‘Time’ takes place when we understand Dogen’s ‘UJI’ or ‘Being-Time’ as a fleeting ‘Moment’ of existence. That is Samadhi experience of the timeless leaking through the quantized time of existential moments. Then TIME IS ON YOUR SIDE AND NOT FLYING AWAY…THIS IS THE TRUE MEANING OF THIS SONG. ‘Here and Now’ the past and future are gathered and not separate – this is APPERCEIVING -SEEING BEYOND THE SUBJECT-OBJECT SPLIT.

Village Pond During Monsoon, Bengal

*”Through the mind alone (purified by knowledge) is IT to be realized. There is no differentiation whatsoever in the Brahman. He goes from death to death who sees in IT, as it were, differentiation”. – Brihadaranyaka Upanishad

To see beyond differences is to be realised in the Noumenal

The ‘Duality’ is the manifested phenomenal aspect of our extension in 3Dspace-time

Not a single particle exists separately

It is actually a temporary localised pulse emerging from a larger field

The phrase ‘as it were’ (iva) is the crux of the Upanishadic instruction regarding the universe and our daily life in it. Whenever the Upanishads seem to concede the reality of the world, even in the slightest degree, the phrase ‘as it were’ is to be added; for anything ‘other’ than Brahman is an appearance.

ORDINARY MIND is the TAO when it is free from INTENTIONAL ACTION – MINDFULNESS OF BODY

A project involving scientists from the UK and India to predict monsoon rainfall by studying ocean processes in the Bay of Bengal launches today.

Scientists from the University of East Anglia (UEA) will release underwater robots to monitor how ocean conditions influence monsoon rainfall. Meanwhile collaborators from a partner project led by the University of Reading with collaborators across the UK and India will use a state-of-the-art aircraft to take atmospheric measurements at the same time.

It is hoped that the combined results of this large-scale scientific campaign will help forecast the arrival of the Indian monsoon more accurately than ever before.

As well as improving rainfall prediction, the research could revolutionise subsistence farming, improve the livelihoods of millions of people, and help mitigate the damage caused by monsoons when they hit land.

Summer monsoons provide 80 per cent of annual rainfall to around a billion people in India.

Forecasting the precise timing and location of the rains is vital to the region’s economy, which is dominated by farming, and for managing its increasingly pressured water resources.

Accurate predictions of intense downpours and breaks in the monsoon are essential to help farmers plan their crop planting and communities prepare for floods and droughts.

Last year, the monsoon spread rapidly over northern India, causing devastating damage, whereas prolonged breaks in 2009 led to a severe shortage of rainfall and poor harvests.

Lead researcher Prof Adrian Matthews, from UEA’s School of Environmental Sciences, said: “The Indian monsoon is notoriously hard to predict. It is a very complicated weather system and the processes are not understood or recorded in science.

“We will be combining oceanic and atmospheric measurements to monitor weather systems as they are generated. Nobody has ever made observations on this scale during the monsoon season itself so this is a truly ground-breaking project.

“We are aiming for a better understanding of the actual physical processes. What we have now are imperfect models for predicting monsoon rainfall when it hits land, so this will create better forecasts.

“Ultimately, the goal is to improve the prediction of monsoon rainfall over India. This will be enormously beneficial for India’s subsistence farmers, who need to know when and how much rain will fall. This would then enable them to change the timing of how they plant their crops.

“We hope that it will also help to mitigate international disasters caused by extreme rainfall and flooding.

“We also hope to better understand how the southern Asian monsoon affects the whole world’s climate,” he added.

The Bay of Bengal Boundary Layer Experiment (BoBBLE) is led by UEA scientists in collaboration with the University of Reading and the National Oceanography Centre (NOC) in Southampton.

Collaborators in India include the Centre for Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences (CAOS), the Indian National Centre for Climate Information Services (INCOIS), the National Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting (NCMRWF) and the National Institute of Ocean Technology (NIOT).

The UEA team will arrive in India today and are due to set sail on June 24 from Chennai into the Bay of Bengal on the Indian research ship the Sindhu Sadhana.

Dr M Rajeevan, secretary for the Indian Ministry of Earth Sciences, will visit the ship and meet the research team on the afternoon of its departure.

Once out in the ocean, they will then release seven underwater gliders to measure ocean properties such as temperature, salinity and current.

The team will spend a month at sea – with data from the 250-mile stretch of international water beamed back to the UK using mobile phone signals daily.

Back in the UK, researchers at UEA, the University of Reading and NOC, will use this data to create computer models of the ocean to determine how it affects weather systems and rainfall over India.

“Our collaborators will be flying out from Bangalore to make simultaneous observations in the atmosphere above us. It will be really rather spectacular,” added Prof Matthews.

Previous missions undertaken by UEA’s fleet of gliders have helped researchers make a variety of discoveries including why the Antarctic ice caps are melting.

The project is funded by the Natural Environment Research Council, the Newton Fund, the Indian Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES) and the UK’s Met Office.

ENDS

1/ For more information, or to arrange an interview, please contact Lisa Horton in the UEA press office on 01603 592764 or email l.horton@uea.ac.uk.

2/ The University of East Anglia (UEA) is among the top 1% of universities globally (Times Higher Education World Rankings 2014-15) and placed 10th in the UK for the quality of its research output (Research Excellence Framework 2014). Also known for its outstanding student experience, it has achieved a Top 10 rating in the National Student Survey every year since the survey began. UEA is a leading member of the Norwich Research Park – one of Europe’s largest concentrations of researchers in the fields of environment, health and plant science. www.uea.ac.uk.

3/ The Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) is the UK’s main agency for funding and managing world-class research, training and knowledge exchange in the environmental sciences. It coordinates some of the world’s most exciting research projects, tackling major issues such as climate change, environmental influences on human health, the genetic make-up of life on earth, and much more. NERC receives around £320 million a year from the government’s science budget, which it uses to fund independent research and training in universities and its own research centres. www.nerc.ac.uk

“The Final Chakra is Niralambasthana which consists of an infinite series of lobes, colours, matrikas, devas, worlds, it’s considered as the Highest seat of the Gurudeva”. ..Beyond this series there is a set of 20 voids and the Final Liberation takes place in the Great Void”. -(Pandit Gopinath Kaviraj)